


Like a Shaft, Clear and Cold

by Im_The_Doctor (Bofur1)



Category: Sneakers (1992)
Genre: Accidents, Angst and Tragedy, Awkward Conversations, Blind Character, Childhood Memories, Christmas Presents, Concerned Friends, Denial of Feelings, Electrocution, Explanations, Fighting Over Toys, Major Character Injury, Past Violence, Siblings, Tolkien Quotes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-20
Updated: 2014-07-20
Packaged: 2018-02-09 15:20:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1987836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bofur1/pseuds/Im_The_Doctor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“Do you remember what happened?” Carl blurts out.<br/>Whistler sighs and shakes his head. “What happened when?”<br/>“I mean...” Carl audibly swallows. “What made you go blind?”<em></em></em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a Shaft, Clear and Cold

Whistler has always had a good memory. Age hasn’t really affected it, so his friends can trust him with things they might forget or might not know in the first place. Usually it was simple things:

“Hey, Whis, let’s get some this-or-that later. Don’t forget, okay?”

“Whistler, you remember the code for such-and-such?”

It’s always a rhetorical question because Whistler likes to be prompt, so he sets his mind to it right then. He’s never told the others, but his memory hinges on light. Whenever he needs to remember something important, he focuses on a mental beam of information that lights the darkness behind his eyes. Depending on the subject, every light is a different color and this is how Whistler maintains calm in the world’s endless darkness.

Now Whistler has just finished a good book, _The Return of the King_ by Tolkien, and he leans back on the couch, ready for either an address from one of the others or a nap. The prior doesn’t come right away, as they’re all bustling about across the room. Whistler habitually turns an ear toward them and sorts out the sounds.

Mother and Crease are arguing about some Armenian Conspiracy, Liz is slicing cucumber for sandwiches, Carl is sitting on the counter and kicking the cabinet immediately below, and Bish is still working on that crossword puzzle that’s been troubling him for the past three days.

Basically a normal routine, Whistler decides, taking a deep breath and readjusting so he can get more comfortable for his nap. He continues to listen absently to the others’ doings and then perks up a bit. No more cabinet-kicking. Carl’s walking hesitantly toward the couch where he is. Sitting back up, Whistler pats the spot on his right. “What’s up, Carl?”

“Oh, nothing,” Carl replies, sinking down next to Whistler and pulling his knees up to his chest. They sit in silence for a while, but Whistler can tell it’s starting to get tense. Carl is radiating an uncomfortable, unasked question; Whistler can hear him feverishly running his fingernails against the grain of fabric—track pants, ribbed cashmere and silk-blend, open legs but cuffed at the ankle...

Whistler eventually dislikes the heat coming off the younger man and says matter-of-factly, “Carl, what’s your question?”

“Um. Well, I was just wondering, Whistler...”

Whistler simply turns his dark, sightless eyes toward Carl, hoping it will unnerve him into just asking his question. Sure enough, it’s foolproof:

“Do you remember what happened?” Carl blurts out.

Whistler sighs and shakes his head. “What happened _when_?”

“I mean...” Carl audibly swallows. “What made you go blind?”

Whistler freezes and hears the others across the room do the same. Carl is probably blanching under the weight of their shocked stares, Whistler’s included.

Once his disbelief wears off, Marty starts admonishing. “Carl, Whistler might not want to talk about that! Why are you even asking?”

Carl’s shoulder brushes gently against Whistler’s as he shrugs awkwardly. “I don’t know. I just...I don’t know.” He sounds embarrassed and, in the others’ minds, he ought to be.

“I know you don’t,” Whistler says abruptly, turning his head, imagining he’s looking at each of them in turn. “None of you do. Bish has said it before, right? We all have our secrets. That’s been mine.”

“I’m sorry—” Carl tries to say, but Whistler reaches out a hand and miraculously finds his shoulder on the first try.

“No, it’s alright. I’ll tell you.” Letting his hand slip back into his lap, Whistler takes a deep breath. “When I was a kid, probably—what, eight years old?—my older brother, Kasper, and I both got the same toy. I don’t remember exactly what it was, maybe a slinky or somethin’. Yeah, I think that was it. We’d both wanted them for a while so our parents finally gave in and got them for Christmas. We loved them to death, played with them all the time, but then Kasper’s got tangled somehow and wouldn’t unknot. He wanted me to give him mine, but I said no, so he shoved me into the wall.” Whistler tsks and forces a rueful smile. “Power outlet, exposed wires...you can guess the rest.”

By the tense silence that follows, Whistler can tell they aren’t buying his nonchalance, so he stops smiling. “Look, it sounds worse than it was. Besides, by now don’t you think I’m _used_ to being blind?”

“It’s still horrible,” Liz says quietly.

Whistler blinks unnecessarily. “I don’t want you all feeling sorry for me. I’m fine with it; it’s practically an _asset_ to me! I feel and hear things none of you do, right? We wouldn’t be where we are now if I could see. Remember the Janek box?”

Mumbles of “Yeah, I guess” answer him and he nods forcefully. “Yeah, _I guess_ too. Now you know, so we can move on.” Whistler shifts, digging a foot into Carl’s ribs and making him get off the couch so he can stretch out. Feeling the others still staring at him, he turns his face into the couch cushions, obviously telling them to leave.

The cucumber chopping returns first. The quieter-than-before clack of shoes against cabinet wood. The flipping pages of a conspiracy magazine, the scoff of the disbelieving, and the resulting argument. The reluctant scrubs of an eraser destroying yet another crossword fail. Then an ivory-lit stream of memory:

 _There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tower high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach_.

Last of all, the heart-clench of brittle thunder and grim, lightning-bruised eyes spilling rain which only the couch cushion ever sees.


End file.
